


from everything to nothing

by waywardrenegades



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 'No Rest For the Wicked' Coda, Gen, Implied Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-23
Updated: 2013-02-23
Packaged: 2017-12-03 07:56:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/696005
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/waywardrenegades/pseuds/waywardrenegades
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time he’d sat in that seat, it had felt like his world was on fire. This time, Sam knew that it was in ashes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	from everything to nothing

**Author's Note:**

> A 'No Rest For the Wicked' Coda

The first time he’d sat in that seat, it had felt like his world was on fire. This time, Sam knew that it was in ashes.

He’d watched as it caught up in flames and burnt to the ground in front of him. 

 

He curled his long fingers around the leather steering wheel and took a deep breath. The familiar smell of his home on wheels - gunpowder, leather, fast food leftovers - mixed with the coppery tinge of blood. Blood under his fingernails, blood on his shirt, blood on the amulet hanging around his neck.  

None of it his.

Although it may as well have been.  

The first time he’d sat in that seat, his brother had been right next to him, cranking the stereo and filling the car with Zeppelin and laughter. This time, the car was so quiet Sam could hear his own heartbeat. 

His teeth dug into his bottom lip, pressing and pressing until he broke through the skin. He felt the give of the flesh, tasted the blood, smelt the metallic stench entering his nostrils. 

His blood. 

The way it should have been.

 

The first time he’s sat in that seat, Dean had shoved an elbow in his side. 

_“You screw up my car and I kill you, Sammy.”_

_“It’s not even your car yet Dean.”_

_“Doesn’t give you permission to fuck it up, jackass,” Dean rolled the window down and leaned back in the seat, tipping his sunglasses down the bridge of his nose, his green eyes fixed on Sam._  

_Sam cleared his throat, glancing from the open road in front of them to his brother. He could feel the heat from Dean’s gaze on the side of his head, a blush creeping up his neck until it reached his ears._  

_“Stop staring at me, you freak,” Sam croaked out, hating himself for the way his voice dipped and cracked. He hazarded a glance out of the corner of his eye and found Dean smiling._

_Sam’s heart lodged itself in his throat as he hungrily took in the freckles peppering Dean’s cheekbones, the curl of the eyelashes that framed his obscenely green eyes, the curve of his cocky half-smile._

_Dean’s smile widened the longer Sam looked, “Come on, Sammy. What’re you waiting for?”_  

 

This time, all Sam had was his memories. 

 

The sound of Dean’s voice echoed in his ears as Sam pressed his foot down on the accelerator. He watched with glazed eyes as the speedometer climbed higher and higher. 70 miles per hour, then 75, then 80.  

_“You screw up my car and I’ll kill you, Sammy.”_

Sam’s hands clenched and unclenched, his eyes dry and unblinking. 

That threat didn’t sound so bad anymore. 

He swallowed past the lump in his throat. He would give anything for Dean to wake up, to sit up from where Sam had laid him in the back seat and tell him to slow the fuck down, or he’d kick his ass. 

The first time he’d sat in that seat, it had been Dean’s car.  

Maybe not officially, but in every other sense. Dean cared about it more than Dad ever had, spending hours and hours babying it, getting it to near perfect condition. Sam was amazed that he was even let near the Impala, let alone the fact that Dean was letting him _drive_ it. 

_“Are you sure this is okay, Dean?”_

_“What’re you chickening out on me now?” Dean asked with a smirk._

_“No, but... what if I mess up?”_

_“I thought you wanted to learn how to drive.”_

_“I do, I just -”_

_“Then drive, Sammy. Just drive.”_

 

So Sam drove. 

He rolled down the windows, screamed himself hoarse, cried until he had no more tears left to give. His heart was somewhere on the floor of the Impala, rolling around in the back seat with each turn the car took, straining the tether that connected it to his brother. 

Each tree or cement barrier he passed taunted him. He looked down at his hands; hands that were caked with his brother’s blood, the evidence of the sacrifice he had made so that Sam could live, and was overwhelmed with the realization that he could wrench his hands at any time, swerve the car, and crash straight into whatever inanimate object was at the side of the road. 

At least then he’d be with Dean. 

But he couldn’t do it; as much as he wanted to, he couldn’t do that to his brother. 

He drove for nearly four hours - over the state line, past road markers, through small Midwestern towns - until he couldn’t take it anymore; the silence, the smell, the knowledge that his brother’s body was getting colder and colder with each passing second. 

 

In Pontiac, Illinois, Sam finally stopped moving. 

 

He pulled the car to the side of the road and froze, his hands clamped on the wheel, eyes burning a hole in the asphalt ahead of him. 

 

The first time he’d sat in this seat, he’d been burning from the inside out, ready to claw at his own skin to get out of it, to get away from all the feelings he shouldn’t have been having.  

This time, he would gladly set himself on fire if it meant seeing his brother smile again. 

 

The first time he’d sat in this seat, his brother had been his everything. 

This time, he had nothing. 


End file.
